Encyclopedia of Society and Culture in the Ancient World

to solve many of Rome’s economic problems. He canceled some debts while creating a new mechanism to help debtors repay their obl ...

attempts to reform the currency. A reform of the empire’s tax system was somewhat more successful. It created one system of taxa ...

NORTH AMERICA In North America a long-distance system of exchange was developing by about 4000 b.c.e. As nomadic peoples learned ...

were inherited. As religious subjects provided not only la- bor for the construction of temples but also food and other goods, p ...

scrapers were used to depulp the leaves of the agave plant, especially the henequen variety, to produce rope and twine. Tobacco ...

Andean civilizations to the south and the lowlands of Central America. SOUTH AMERICA In South America a great variety of natural ...

important for elders to preserve and transmit that knowledge for future generations. In later, literate cultures more formal sch ...

time from the next step in the life cycle by the elder men, who controlled younger men’s labor, but some of the new adult fe- ma ...

side to the cities, where they found more teachers and more social mobility based on education. Egyptian education in this perio ...

and students doing work in many major cities, including Ur, Uruk, Nippur, Shuruppak, and Abu Salabikh. Between 2000 and 1500 b.c ...

speaking Sumerian. but Mesopotamian students kept learn- ing it; they used it much as Latin was used in medieval Europe, as a de ...

who would be more loyal to the state than the hereditary no- bility was. Consequently, the ancient curriculum consisted largely ...

ing a horse. Th ere were also the “four exercises of weapons”: archery, use of the javelin, use of the quarter-staff , and use o ...

strength and endurance training, various foot races (includ- ing races while wearing armor), and the acquisition of mili- tary s ...

Athens is not the only model, however. Th e poetry of Sap- pho (sixth century b.c.e.), from the island of Lesbos, not only shows ...

At about the age of 15, students passed to the third and fi nal stage of formal education under the rhetor. Rhetoric was fi rst ...

Created by the Adena (ca. 1000 b.c.e.–ca. 200 c.e.) and Hopewell (ca. 200 b.c.e.–ca. 400 c.e.) cultures in the area around south ...

▶ empires and dynasties introduction When people think about history, it is likely that kings and queens, emperors and empresses ...

sciences and empirical reasoning. Th e Romans have left their alphabet, their language, and their laws in numerous modern langua ...

dria was larger. It was protected by massive walls that were 23 miles in length. Th e city also had marketplaces, towers, a thea ...